This ad didn’t just bring up my fear of electrical sockets, it’s allowing me to look back at some of the most impressionable marketing campaigns of my youth so I can be newly traumatized with fresh, progressive-lensed eyes.
She was neither hip, cool, nor your age 🤣. I don’t know where exactly that leaves us aside from the fact that I very much wonder if I’d recognize the smell of Jean Nate at this point in my life.
I am still traumatized by the flying monkeys on Wizard of Oz - images of kidnapping, torturing and evil all around us. Just this year I cringed in fear as I watched the scene in Wicked which shows the monkeys writhing in agony on the floor as they sprout their wings.
Full disclosure - I took everything very literally, e.g. For "daylight savings time" I went outside put some daylight in a jar, closed the jar and stored it in my closet.
I'm a Baby Boomer so by the time that ad came out I had segued out of the drug culture (not that I was ever part of it!). The ad made me more anxious about fried eggs!
I can just picture some traditional Boomer parent complaining about how the hugging ad singing about love was just a bunch of hippy nonsense shortly before going to whack one of their children with a belt.
My mom and I used to love acting out those child abuse PSA's. She would sneer at me and yell, "You're pathetic!" And we would just laugh and laugh. Probably not the exact intent of the ads but it was our way of bonding!
Not to put too fine a point on it, but aren’t Boomers hippies? I feel like these ads are directed towards the next generation up. The oldest Boomers turned 30 in 1976.
So funny, I’ve been joking that all these DraftKings and FanDuel commercials have left me longing for old school douche commercials 😂 Congratulations on being named a finalist!!
My boomer parents did their best to child-proof the house. They put these nifty little plastic plug covers over the electrical outlets. Did they work? Nope. My 5 year old ass pulled one of those little plastic pieces out and put my metal toy car between the outlet and the nightlight. Sparks flew, and the breakers blew, except the one with the toy and nightlight. My dad jumped like I had shocked him. He grabbed his belt, snapped the nightlight out of the plug, then laid into my ass for doing something so damned stupid.
I am a Gen X kid, I climbed the TV tower, I climbed the windmill, I climbed the haybales and jumped off. I went places where kids aren't allowed to go, and you know what? I survived.
Kids today are too afraid to walk three blocks from school to the house. We can't bubble wrap the whole world, yanno.
Probably. But that incident taught me to respect electricity. Like a gun, it's a tool that can kill you. There are many things I respect that can kill you. Fire, Guns, Knives, electricity, poisons, cars, trucks, trains, crazy 1000-pound bulls, etc.
You'll see, I said respect, not fear. I don't avoid them, but I tread carefully.
This was sooooo freakin’ funny, Bestie. I’m dying here (no, I didn’t take a shiv from Mr. Electric). How do I not remember that ad? It’s AMAZING. I do, however, remember that Love’s ad now that you’ve reminded me. What in the wide world of fuck?!? I’m shocked that was considered okay even back then. Was everyone just so hungover from all the whiskey sours and gin rickeys they swilled down at their key parties to realize how disturbing that was?
Thank you, bestie! And honestly as I was going through these ads I thought of you and your day hustle and thinking how much fun you would have had in this completely unfettered, no rules, fuck with all the kids advertising era! The true golden age!
Oh man. It would have been a blast. I have a few books that are collections of old ads and they just had so much more fun back then. Okay, too much fun, but nobody got hurt. Okay, people definitely got hurt, but that’s the price you pay for great art!
Omggg, every one of these!!! The benzos is an earworm for me to this day. The douching—I have a hilarious story about that I’ll tell you offline, and the scary electrical guy…all of them!
It explains so much! I love that you still remember the benzo‘s jingle too. It was actually quite good. Never thought I’d say this, but can’t wait for the douching story!
When I was a kid there was an add showing a child climbing an electricity pylon to get his kite. He got electrocuted and we watched him fall to the ground and die. Happy days!!
The Pop Culture Preservation Society podcast was talking about those ads recently. Apparently there were several, and after the first kid dies his brother tries to go help him and ALSO dies! I'm glad I missed those because I think I would have been scarred for life.
WHAAAAATTT??? First, I need to check this podcast out immediately. Second, who would make a series of ads like that?????? OMG kids dying was just content for these weirdos!! Remember Afterschool Specials?
You will absolutely love it! The three hosts are so fun, they have great camaraderie and so many fun memories to share!
And oh wow, the afterschool specials were always so upsetting! I particularly remember the one about the girl who shoplifted that ends with the jail cell door clanging closed and a freeze frame of her terrified face. It worked, though ... I was never remotely tempted to shoplift!
Great article. I don’t remember the electricity, but I did think of Mr. Met when I saw him.
Also the 10pm PSA is STILL on- though not so colorful. The few times I’m awake at that time, I crack up when I see it, because these days no kid ever leaves the house! It’s 10pm do you know where your children are? Yeah in their room playing same f’n video game they’ve been playing since they woke up.
It's still on???? Amazing! And you are so right-- that's exactly where my kid is right now! It would be funny to remake a spoof of that ad and just pan over 5 feet to the kid all glazed over in front of their PC.
Annnnd another great Gen X childhood reference! The Flintstones! I always felt so bad for Tina when they did that. And it’s true we were gone all day with no communication!
Only realized from reading THIS post that I had an aversion to fried eggs for so long only because Mr. Why-So-Surly? gym couch fried that egg. And what was with the “Any questions?” Actually, I have SO many questions, sir yes sir!
Also I was alive when that “we’re not candy ad” came out but don’t remember it because slightly too young, BUT I got to the end and saw the Long Island phone number and was like YES, 516. I AM SO PROUD OF US.
Susan, this comment is everything! The gym coach and sir yes sir we have SO MANY questions! I love/hate how he starts off like we're a bunch of dumb dumbs who JUST DIDN'T GET IT so he has to explain it again. It makes no sense! NONE!
“Ok i found my stupid kid, now what do I do with it?” 🤣🤣🤣 stop it. Hilarious. Sadly we missed many of these adverts in Australia but I’ll never forget the 1980s AIDS one with the grim reaper out of my mind.
It literally had the grim reaper then pin bowling, but the pins were people, including little kids. I was literally just talking about this ad on the weekend with a bunch of 50 year old men who were all like "oh we definitely thought we were all going to die of AIDS"
I’m American so I never saw that ad, but I sure do remember thinking we were all going to die of AIDS. My mom was a nurse and she came home from work one time when I was in my early teens and said they’d had a training on AIDS that day and the trainer said it was only a matter of time before AIDS became airborne.
Thanks for the highly triggering walk down the memory lane of my precious youth, Shelly!
Ahhhh yeah, maybe should have put a trigger warning on this! 🤣
Like the adorable singing benzos, Mr Yuk was actually so inviting. A bright green beacon
Hahahhahah I love that you refer to Mr. Yuck as “inviting!”
OMG I was totally remembering my grandmom wearing Jean Nate as you talked about scents and then you brought it up!!
Also, you can get that electric guy on a tshirt now. You should totally buy one.
OMG YOU CAN??? It would be aversion therapy for me! Your grandma was either very hip and cool or is MY AGE!!! hahahahhahha omg...
She was neither hip, cool, nor your age 🤣. I don’t know where exactly that leaves us aside from the fact that I very much wonder if I’d recognize the smell of Jean Nate at this point in my life.
You would. It would jolt you like Mr. Electricity shanking lil' Timmy.
🤣🤣
I am still traumatized by the flying monkeys on Wizard of Oz - images of kidnapping, torturing and evil all around us. Just this year I cringed in fear as I watched the scene in Wicked which shows the monkeys writhing in agony on the floor as they sprout their wings.
Full disclosure - I took everything very literally, e.g. For "daylight savings time" I went outside put some daylight in a jar, closed the jar and stored it in my closet.
Flying monkeys = SAME!
Daylight savings = that’s actually adorable! Do the fried egg drug ad probably worked on you then?!
I'm a Baby Boomer so by the time that ad came out I had segued out of the drug culture (not that I was ever part of it!). The ad made me more anxious about fried eggs!
Right???? I still don't like them!
This made me laugh out loud. Seemed so normal back then!
You are so right! All so normal! I wonder what our kids will look back on nowadays that will make them think we were crazy too.
I can just picture some traditional Boomer parent complaining about how the hugging ad singing about love was just a bunch of hippy nonsense shortly before going to whack one of their children with a belt.
My mom and I used to love acting out those child abuse PSA's. She would sneer at me and yell, "You're pathetic!" And we would just laugh and laugh. Probably not the exact intent of the ads but it was our way of bonding!
Not to put too fine a point on it, but aren’t Boomers hippies? I feel like these ads are directed towards the next generation up. The oldest Boomers turned 30 in 1976.
Not all of them. My parents were not, despite being young and free in the 60’s!
So funny, I’ve been joking that all these DraftKings and FanDuel commercials have left me longing for old school douche commercials 😂 Congratulations on being named a finalist!!
Old-School Douche Commercials! I can't...! Thank you, Liz!
Ah, the memories And soundtrack of my youth.
Right?! They don’t make ads like they used to!
Hey, that's a classic Ad. 😎
My boomer parents did their best to child-proof the house. They put these nifty little plastic plug covers over the electrical outlets. Did they work? Nope. My 5 year old ass pulled one of those little plastic pieces out and put my metal toy car between the outlet and the nightlight. Sparks flew, and the breakers blew, except the one with the toy and nightlight. My dad jumped like I had shocked him. He grabbed his belt, snapped the nightlight out of the plug, then laid into my ass for doing something so damned stupid.
I am a Gen X kid, I climbed the TV tower, I climbed the windmill, I climbed the haybales and jumped off. I went places where kids aren't allowed to go, and you know what? I survived.
Kids today are too afraid to walk three blocks from school to the house. We can't bubble wrap the whole world, yanno.
Hey, you were the reason we had the scary electric knife guy! 🤣🤣🤣
Probably. But that incident taught me to respect electricity. Like a gun, it's a tool that can kill you. There are many things I respect that can kill you. Fire, Guns, Knives, electricity, poisons, cars, trucks, trains, crazy 1000-pound bulls, etc.
You'll see, I said respect, not fear. I don't avoid them, but I tread carefully.
This was sooooo freakin’ funny, Bestie. I’m dying here (no, I didn’t take a shiv from Mr. Electric). How do I not remember that ad? It’s AMAZING. I do, however, remember that Love’s ad now that you’ve reminded me. What in the wide world of fuck?!? I’m shocked that was considered okay even back then. Was everyone just so hungover from all the whiskey sours and gin rickeys they swilled down at their key parties to realize how disturbing that was?
Thank you, bestie! And honestly as I was going through these ads I thought of you and your day hustle and thinking how much fun you would have had in this completely unfettered, no rules, fuck with all the kids advertising era! The true golden age!
Oh man. It would have been a blast. I have a few books that are collections of old ads and they just had so much more fun back then. Okay, too much fun, but nobody got hurt. Okay, people definitely got hurt, but that’s the price you pay for great art!
Omggg, every one of these!!! The benzos is an earworm for me to this day. The douching—I have a hilarious story about that I’ll tell you offline, and the scary electrical guy…all of them!
It’s a miracle we made it.
And it explains why we’re like we are. 🤣
It explains so much! I love that you still remember the benzo‘s jingle too. It was actually quite good. Never thought I’d say this, but can’t wait for the douching story!
🤣🤣🤣🤣
So funny and inappropriate 🤣
When I was a kid there was an add showing a child climbing an electricity pylon to get his kite. He got electrocuted and we watched him fall to the ground and die. Happy days!!
The Pop Culture Preservation Society podcast was talking about those ads recently. Apparently there were several, and after the first kid dies his brother tries to go help him and ALSO dies! I'm glad I missed those because I think I would have been scarred for life.
WHAAAAATTT??? First, I need to check this podcast out immediately. Second, who would make a series of ads like that?????? OMG kids dying was just content for these weirdos!! Remember Afterschool Specials?
You will absolutely love it! The three hosts are so fun, they have great camaraderie and so many fun memories to share!
And oh wow, the afterschool specials were always so upsetting! I particularly remember the one about the girl who shoplifted that ends with the jail cell door clanging closed and a freeze frame of her terrified face. It worked, though ... I was never remotely tempted to shoplift!
STOP!!! What in the actual fuck! WE ARE NOT OK!
Great article. I don’t remember the electricity, but I did think of Mr. Met when I saw him.
Also the 10pm PSA is STILL on- though not so colorful. The few times I’m awake at that time, I crack up when I see it, because these days no kid ever leaves the house! It’s 10pm do you know where your children are? Yeah in their room playing same f’n video game they’ve been playing since they woke up.
It's still on???? Amazing! And you are so right-- that's exactly where my kid is right now! It would be funny to remake a spoof of that ad and just pan over 5 feet to the kid all glazed over in front of their PC.
Or “It’s 10am throw your kids outside” Every morning you just see people putting their 8-14 year olds on the front steps like Dino in the Flintstones.
Annnnd another great Gen X childhood reference! The Flintstones! I always felt so bad for Tina when they did that. And it’s true we were gone all day with no communication!
Only realized from reading THIS post that I had an aversion to fried eggs for so long only because Mr. Why-So-Surly? gym couch fried that egg. And what was with the “Any questions?” Actually, I have SO many questions, sir yes sir!
Also I was alive when that “we’re not candy ad” came out but don’t remember it because slightly too young, BUT I got to the end and saw the Long Island phone number and was like YES, 516. I AM SO PROUD OF US.
Thanks for the laughs!
Susan, this comment is everything! The gym coach and sir yes sir we have SO MANY questions! I love/hate how he starts off like we're a bunch of dumb dumbs who JUST DIDN'T GET IT so he has to explain it again. It makes no sense! NONE!
“Ok i found my stupid kid, now what do I do with it?” 🤣🤣🤣 stop it. Hilarious. Sadly we missed many of these adverts in Australia but I’ll never forget the 1980s AIDS one with the grim reaper out of my mind.
Oh lord, WHAT?! This sounds terrifying! Another reason why it's mind blowing the human race carried on after these ads!
It literally had the grim reaper then pin bowling, but the pins were people, including little kids. I was literally just talking about this ad on the weekend with a bunch of 50 year old men who were all like "oh we definitely thought we were all going to die of AIDS"
I’m American so I never saw that ad, but I sure do remember thinking we were all going to die of AIDS. My mom was a nurse and she came home from work one time when I was in my early teens and said they’d had a training on AIDS that day and the trainer said it was only a matter of time before AIDS became airborne.
Yep. I remember being terrified! Again, it’s amazing the human race continued with how scary having sex seemed!
😳😳😳😳 Umm, yeah, I would never even go on a date let alone sleep with someone if I saw that ad!
TEN pin bowling. Why can't we edit comments?!
Love this, thanks for all the time you gave into putting it altogether. Gotta love those '70s! 😉
Well thank you for reading it, Darcy! That makes my re-traumatization worth it! 🤣